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Thursday, September 15, 2011

the love high, career low BLOW OFF

Someone once old me you can never have all three of the following things: a great relationship, a great apartment/house, and a great job. I didn't always believe it and for a good portion of the last year, I was lucky enough to have all three, but the tide has turned.

I've been feeling a little stalled career wise. As most of you know, I left my job a year and a half ago to pursue writing full time. The first seven or eight months were great...I was making consistent money with a much more flexible schedule than my day job allowed. Which also left me way more time to work on the BLOW OFF. And then around September of 2010...right after I got engaged...everything shifted. My relationship was at its peak, my apartment was still great and something had to go. So, for the last year, I've gotten a string of writing job BLOW OFFS.

I've gotten pretty good and not letting them get me down. It sounds cliche, but you do have to have a thick skin to work in the entertainment industry and other writers have taught me that you're always going to hear NO more than you're going to hear YES. Pity parties can only last less than 24 hours before you sit in front of a computer again and start your next pitch or script.

But it still effing sucks. My most recent rejection came the day after my wedding. I had applied to a writer's program at a studio and I had high hopes for at least making it to the interview round. I was still riding the high of getting married when I made the giant mistake of opening the mail. There was a letter from the studio. I assumed it was just one of those free screening for your consideration things that get sent out to Writer's Guild members, so you can imagine my surprise when I opened it and it was a big fat rejection letter. Within seconds, my love high was overshadowed by my career low. I wanted to cry. Luckily, the H bomb (the word I will be using for husband from now on) was there with a beer and a bad on demand movie to make me feel better.

By the time this post is up on the BLOW OFF, I'll be wrapping up my honeymoon and getting ready to come back to real life. I will no longer have "wedding planning" as an excuse to distract me from my career. I'm determined to get some good writing news by 2012. Cause if I have to hear another person tell me I don't have to worry, I have a husband to take care of me now, I'll cut a bitch.

for what it's worth, i spent most of my twenties with zero of those three, and yet i still hold steadfast to the belief that it's totally possible to have all three at once. it's an unbridled optimism that most people take for naivety, but, like you said, it's the same unbridled optimism that's inspired me to keep writing, even when, for example, someone read a script of mine and told me they "didn't laugh once." it was funny, i swear!

about the blow off

We've all been blown off, we've all blown someone off. Share your story: the blow off texts, emails, voice mail messages you've either sent or received to mark the end of a relationship. And if the blow off consisted of a disappearing act, post a missing person's report. Or just read stories about break ups in general.